#ConfessionIsGoodFortheSOUL

Wow! it has been almost a year since my first post.  Yes-----a whole year (sigh).  What have I learned since then?  I learned  the same thing most writers know: when life churns and if writing is not your full-time job--writing will to takes a back seat to the happenings of life.  There is nothing profound about this admission.  It just is #confessionisgoodforthesoul.

I have decided to return to my blog.  To commit to honor this part of my being by posting once a month, at minimum, to Persimmon  & Maple for the next three months (yep! I put it in print--yikes!).

I recently watched a video ( http://unionforum.org/2014/04/21/womanism-at-union-a-past-a-present-a-future) wherein one of the mothers of womanist theology, Dr. Katie Geneva Cannon, reminds us not only are we all born with a purpose but each of us are also here to "do the work your soul must have."  Writing is both part of my purpose and soul work.  When I set aside time to write--just like exercising, eating well, praying and listening to God consistently-my soul has an unmistakable sense of peace and contentment.

When I do the things which honor my being I am also remind of one of the happiest times of my girlhood: sitting on my grandma's front porch in Baton Rouge, LA enjoying a Dixie cup.  Us kids would be eating these sweet cool treats on a hot, muggy, southern summers day and in between our delight.  One of us would say something that would tickle grandma way down deep.  I can hear her laughing as I write this... thank you grandma for the Dixie cups and great summer memories. #LoveYOU&missYOUhard 

HOME

My momma grew up on the corner of Persimmon & Maple in Mobile, Alabama and was born in Lucedale, Mississippi. My daddy was born in Shreveport, Louisiana and raised in Baton Rouge. Both, Southern born and raised. Two of my four siblings were born in Mobile and the rest in California: Los Angeles and Upland, I was born in Pomona, California the city which hails as our 'home' on the West. Suffice it to say, "You can take my people out of the South but you can't take the South out of my people." We've been raised with all the values of Southern Folk---values that I am proud of and pass on to the next generation. It is true, "there's no place like home." Though my beingness; my womyness straddles between Pomona, Mobile, and Baton Rouge---I remain quite footed. As a girl I never quite understood or appreciated my Southern roots, as I do now, having some age on me (smile).

HOME is the center of my compass. It is what balances me.  I have learned HOME is in me even when I am away. When you are with me on Persimmon & Maple I will gift you a glimpse of my HOME and welcome the sharing of yours. For you see:

I am a descendent of those whose names I will never know.
May God rest there souls in the chill of the Atlantic
and the soil of this land.
I am my great grandmothers & great grandfathers
grandmothers
grandfathers
auntees
uncles
cousins
nieces  nephews
siblings  momma   and   daddy
                                     Yes, 'dey is in me. Big and full. So, iz smile.'

Now, of course I know HOME 'ain't all sugar and spice and everything nice.'  I know all of us folks who comprise 'home' can also 'cause a hurtin' on one another in ways never, ever, even before conceived.   It makes me ask, "How do you understand the Greatest Commandment to love your neighbor as you love yourself ?!" And then treat another with such disregard, judgement, hypocritical Christianity and meanness.  Like ain't no blood relationship or intimate knowingness* shared.  HOME ain't all the times good.

Them kin (blood or not)--like me--still make up HOME.

And, you can't choose your kin.

HOME is HOME.

HOME is
joy and pain, bitter and sweet,
good and bad,
a place of possibility, hope, endings
and beginnings again
it is familiar
it is an anchor
it is laughter, tears, and tickles
it is the smell of sweet potatoes baking
and Sunday dinners
it is fights with brothers and sisters and making up again
it is I'm sorry, forgive me and love--indeed
it is momma doin' hair in the kitchen
daddy grillin' outside
it is uno, double six, and bid whis
it is uncles signifyin'
while auntees hollah', "Sho' nuf!"
it is catfish 'n grits, fried green tomatoes, smothered chicken,
grandma's gingerbread and étouffée
it is where we stretch 10 cents to make a dollar
with enuf to feed us and errbody else!
home is family
by love
by blood & by knowingness
it is peace
it is prayers
it is where
band aids are placed with love
even on wounds
too invisible
for the
eye

H O M E   IS

So, WELCOME to a li'l piece of my HOME.  Won't you have a sit down and stay a while, as I share the meanderings of my mind?  My hope is that my words--poetry, prose, political, spiritual and rant---will ease onto your palette like a cool glass of sweet tea & lemonade on a hot, muggy, southern summer's day. I hope the glasses I serve  are not too sweet or too bitter; but life teaches us the bitter does come with the sweet. Can you hear the clanging of the ice in the glass? I can.

*all family is NOT based on blood

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